Physicists have announced that antimatter falls downward, resolving a long-standing question in the realm of particle physics. The study, conducted by the ALPHA collaboration at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Switzerland, sheds light on the elusive nature of antimatter.
Antimatter particles obey gravity: that's the conclusion from a study this week testing whether antimatter - the mirror image material of the matter we're all made from - "falls" upwards, or downwards. Although very much the preserve of the sciFi arena, antimatter is a very real entity - we use it all the time in medical imaging, for instance. In traditional matter, the
In the world of science fiction, warp drives are powered by antimatter, mysterious particles that have an opposite charge and spin of regular particles. If these particles were ever to collide with regular matter, they would annihilate each other, releasing copious amounts of energy. However, according to new research, the exotic material may be a […]
The new study marks the beginning of detailed and direct pursuit of the gravitational nature of antimatter, which remains puzzlingly scarce in the universe.
CERN researchers saw how antihydrogen behaves when it interacts with gravity. (Photo : Brandon Style from Unsplash)How antimatter reacts to gravity A team of physicists tested how an antimatter behaves when it interacts with gravity.